


in these broken arms, you lay

by ninefish



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: CC-2224 | Cody-centric, Heavy Angst, M/M, Order 66 (Star Wars), Seriously Sad, it's just cody being sad sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-08
Updated: 2021-01-08
Packaged: 2021-03-11 23:20:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28625598
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ninefish/pseuds/ninefish
Summary: Obi-Wan dies on Utapau. Cody, under the influence of the chip, struggles to come to terms with that.
Relationships: CC-2224 | Cody/Obi-Wan Kenobi
Comments: 9
Kudos: 69





	in these broken arms, you lay

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this in 3 hours in a sudden need for angst and codywan. any mistakes are my own. enjoy :,)

The hologram of the Chancellor fades from view and Cody looks to the 212th.

_ Good soldiers follow orders _ .

“Blast him.”

Cody watches as his men ready their blasters with calm, brisk precision, firing at will at the small figure that crawls up the cliffside. The words taste like ash in his mouth and something in the back of his mind tugs at him, whispers it shouldn’t be like this, things should be different.

But then the General—  _ the Jedi, the traitor _ — is struck, both him and the varactyl plummeting.

CC-2224’s face is stony as he watches the man he served with, the man he’d slept with, the man he’d, in the boyish freedom tucked under covers, exchanged soft whispers with  _ fall _ .

It’s a tremendous height— no one should be able to survive such a fall— but there’s a cold feeling in CC-2224’s mind that knows the General is dead before he hits the water below. The pleading voice falls silent.

What is a body without life? It’s an object, a machine. The clankers are but animated shells, falling to pieces when shot the right way.

The General in his stiff, morbidly still descent has already turned into a relic.

He disappears from sight and CC-2224 finds himself already moving.

The voice begins again, urging him—  _ no one could survive that fall. He’s gone. Don’t look— _

But CC-2224 has to see. Has to finish the mission.

He gestures to CC-5576-39. “Send out the search drones.” They need confirmation of death to send to the Chancellor.

* * *

It doesn’t take long to find the body.

CC-2224 is called over and he moves quickly, a sense of haste pushing him forward that went beyond the reasonable urgency of duty. Something in him  _ needs _ to see—

The General had been brought out of the small pool of water, his clothes still soaked from being submerged. His head is at a slight, awkward angle— broken. 

_ He’s dead— mission accomplished— Good Soldiers follow Orders— kriff, he’s  _ dead _ — mission— the mission—  _

It’s such a small shift that from a particular angle, CC-2224 could imagine the General was simply lying back. One trooper had even thought to close his eyes before he had arrived— a needless courtesy for a traitor of the Republic. But with his eyes closed, Cody can almost imagine that the General is sleeping— wet and tired instead because of a bout of playful wrestling in the ponds of whatever planet they were stationed on—

_ General, I thought you were washing up— oh don’t be such a bore, Cody, come in! The water’s quite refreshing— _

He can still remember the sound of the General’s laugh, low in a way that would make his chest rumble— 

CC-2224’s gaze lowers and he’s confronted by the General’s stiff, blue-tinged lips, and the fantasy—  _ daydream— useless distraction _ — is broken. He makes no indication of being unsettled but from closing his eyes for a moment. Then CC-2224 continues to catalog the state of the General—  _ the corpse _ .

Surprisingly, there’s hardly any blood on him. The blaster wounds cauterized on impact and even the earlier grime from his battle with Grevious has washed away.

When CC-2224 looks at the General’s still body, he feels nothing. It is the General and not the General— a traitor and yet . . . not. CC-2224 has always felt the underlying pressure to follow orders. It was more than just a want, there was something tugging at him, demanding absolute loyalty. But that voice from before nudges him, offers him the faintest reminisces of sensations. The tender brush of a calloused thumbpad against the scar on his forehead, warmth breath against his cheek, limbs knotting and tangling together—

CC-2224 straightens himself. Those are not his memories. He is a trooper. He is CC-2224.

He should order for the body to be carried away, to be put into the transfer vessel, but something stays him. He tells himself it’s not the memories— because they’re  _ not _ memories— not his, at least. They could not be his memories. But if they were not his, there would be no harm in observing them, as an impartial bystander, he rationalizes to himself.

CC-2224 allows himself a moment of weakness. He kneels, brushing his fingertips against the General’s cheek. There’s the faintest bit of dampness to the skin that cannot conceal how irrevocably, unmistakably dead the General is. 

As if encouraged, the foreign thoughts impress themselves upon him, with such fervor they seem to have a will of their own—

_ Cody, sore and bruised after a battle. A warm washcloth is offered along with a cheeky grin— you know, if you weren’t so clumsy, that chunk of debris wouldn’t have hit you— oh, please, if  _ you _ hadn’t been so focused on your fancy light stick tricks, I wouldn’t have had to push you out of the way— the cloth is accepted, gratefully, a fond smile in return— _

_ They’re on Coruscant— finally, a break from the endless assignments, constant moving. In the bustling security of the city, though, he can’t help but still feel a lingering sense of stress. The war is always out there— waiting for them. Cody can’t help but contemplate the thought of how nice it’d be to steal away the General to one of the remote worlds they’d fought on— one with plenty of nature— and settling. It’d be nice, he muses. He wonders to himself if the thought is treason— _

_ Cody’s fingers trace over pale skin, illuminated by moonlight. Paler than starlight, scars litter his arms and torso, some small nicks, others larger from a lifetime of practice and war. His face flushes at the touch. Why the look? Cody murmurs.  _ You’re stunning. _ I’m not fond of the scars— I can give you tattoos if you’d like. Or, rather, I could ask a vod to do it, I’m not too skilled at them myself. But you’re gorgeous— please, you don’t need to flatter me— I’m not. I’m stating it as I see it. After all, I can hardly lie to you, you’re my superior—  _

CC-2224 pulls back, taken aback. He’s not sure whether to be horrified or longing to be that faceless person named Cody with the person who had held him so gently. These cannot be his memories. He would have remembered them. And if they  _ were  _ his memories . . . even just that glimpse made him grieve for what was lost.

He shakes his head, as if it will banish the memory of  _ those _ memories from his mind.

There is no room for gentleness within the GAR. He is CC-2224 and has always been. CC-2224 will be until he is inevitably lost to the battlefield.

But when he looks down at the body of the General again, the comforting apathy is gone and a wave of nausea rushes over him. 

CC-2224 stumbles—  _ he never stumbles, always sure-footed _ — back. The General is the man in the memories, with that fond laugh—

_ Cody, I forgive you. _

The words aren’t a memory.

CC-2224 waits in tense anticipation for more, but the presence has left. The voice sounded eerily like the General. Strangely, uncomfortably, he feels bereft—

“Commander, where should we move the body?” A trooper approaches him, standing at attention.

CC-2224 is shaken to the present. Right, they are in a warzone. He turns to the trooper. “There should be a freezer ready for transportation,” he says, all authority.

Whatever was in the past doesn’t matter now. The General is dead and CC-2224 is not. As for Cody . . .  _ yes, that was my name. _ He spares one last look at the General before he is lifted into the hovering crate. _ Well, it didn’t matter anymore. _

Good soldiers follow orders. CC-2224 is a good soldier.

The General is pushed away. CC-2224 does his best to forget him and the memories that cannot be his. Because if they were his, he doesn’t think he could recover from that.

On Utapau, Cody is the one who lives, yet there’s a coldness inside he will never quite rid himself of. There are some things forgiveness cannot heal.

**Author's Note:**

> the inconsistencies w cody's name are intentional!! woo for destroying the sense of self.  
> also, sorry if you thought cody was gonna get closure in this. whoops.  
> also- i forgot to mention but the part about transporting obi-wan’s body... jus saying there’s some sneaky palpatine shit behind that :,)))
> 
> [my tumblr](https://ratpadawan.tumblr.com)


End file.
